Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Profile Antics: Bill Ward

Bill Ward was one of the premiere "good girl" comics artists of the 20th century. His risque illustrations in various mens magazines could actually "draw" your attention away from the pages of nude photos - - - and that's saying something.

The talented Ward also logged some time during the golden age of comics working on Quality Comics features Captain Marvel, Bulletman, Mr. Scarlet & Ibis the Invincible, although his contribution was largely on backgrounds. He provided full art duties on select issues of Blackhawk before moving onto freelance work for another publisher and then Ward did a hitch in the Army, where he created his most famous character, Torchy.

Torchy really paved the way for Ward's latter career turn into mostly ribald, or more sexually-explicit work like, The Adventures of Pussycat, Stella Starlet, Sugar Caine & the sexual escapades of Harold Brown in Juggs men's magazine.

How it all began ....

In 1933, publishers at Eastern Color Press, intent to make better use of their printing equipment (which frequently sat idle between jobs), came up with the idea of printing an 8-page comic section that could be folded down from the large broadsheet to a smaller 9-inch by 12-inch format. The result was the first modern comic book. Containing reprints of newspaper comic strips, this experimental comic book titled "Funnies On Parade" was given away for free. It proved so popular that the following year Eastern published "Famous Funnies" and took the bold step of selling the comic for ten cents through chain stores. The enterprise was a smashing success and Eastern began churning out numerous reprints on a monthly basis. Other publishers, eager to get in on the profits, jumped on the bandwagon and the comic book industry was born!